• Modules
• Galactic Center
• Equipment and Items

Introduction

Sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Therefore boots of speed are not only possible, but well recommended in fighting against quick enemies, which there are many. Humans can wear various armor that enchances their abilities or provides resistances and wield advanced weapons. Moreover, it is possible to animate corpses to one's will, and getting huge destructive effects from some alien mechanism is even more possible, as are invisibility, charm mech, and such things.

Wearable Items

Weapons and Armor

/Weapons and Armor

Sensors

Traditional light sources are out of fashion. They are far too easy to see by enemies and carry a massive stealth penalty if not outright aggravation. Instead, people prefer to amplify their natural senses. Passive sensors carry no stealth penalty and surprisingly few places are anywhere near pitch black. Mech places have artificial lighting; the night sky on Snowglade has numerous stars and a black hole accretion disk along with a near-total absence of clouds; the Wedge has its glowing timestone.

In gameplay sense sensors work just like ToME light sources, only the justification is different. Some mechs can wear multiple sets of sensors.

Aspects etc.

Profile < Face < Aspect < Personality

Instead of ring and amulet slots people have spine slots into which can be inserted (ordered by increasing power) Profiles, Faces, and Aspects, condensed recordings of dead people. A Personality is a recording that is almost whole, but they are rare and come with side effects. The Aspects and such enchance one or more of the wielder's skills by giving helpful advice when needed. It is also possible to gain abilities like food creation (the Aspect tells you how to find food almost anywhere). To balance the Aspects, I think the player should be given fewer skill points per level.

Aspects and their relatives are divided into subtypes, and they are all artifacts. Skills and other properties are random (except in the case of truearts), influenced by subtype, and not necessarily all positive. For example, a priest Aspect that was a religious bigot would effectively lower intelligence in addition to doing positive things like increasing spirituality, prayer, and wisdom. There can also be positive or negative ego type like things, such as well-insulated (increases electricity resistance) or badly-insulated (causes electricity vulnerability). Some very old Aspects are the two-slotted model which take two spine-slots to use but may be worth it since they can possess great knowledge in obscure subjects, among other things. All personalities are two-slotted.

Aspect creation chart. These things are meant to be heavily randomized. This chart is just a starting point. An Aspect doesn't need everything in this chart. They can have things not in this chart. Some things in this chart may not be likely to get. This chart is not complete. This chart does not pretend to include all the possible types of Aspects. After all, people are more than stereotypes and the Aspects were real people once.

Examples: (truearts from canon)

• The Engineer Aspect 'Arthur'

• The Two-Slotted Captain Aspect 'Ling'

In general, Aspects are best at theoretical subjects.

Incidentally, monster memory is preserved in a manner similar to Aspects, but condensed to impersonal data. You don't get to switch it out, so it takes no extra slots.

Other Spine-Slot Stuff

Mapping gear is useful for knowing where you are. However it decreases your stealth by being highly visible in radar.

Non-Wearable Items

Items with Charges

Suggested new names:

• Potions --> Drinks (organic creatures only)

• Potions --> Stims (works for everything that can think)

• Scrolls --> Mechanisms

• Staffs --> Accumulators

• Rods --> Generators

Wands and attack rods are replaced by ranged weapons.

Drinks

• Strength
• Intelligence
• Wisdom
• Dexterity
• Constitution
• Charisma
• Radiation resistance

Stims

• System reset (curing)
• Healing
• Sanity
• Regeneration
• Speed

Mechanisms

• Ore detection
• Trap detection
• Mapping
• Wormhole (Word of Recall)

Accumulators

• Healing

Generators

• Wormhole

Scientist's Tools

Spellbooks are replaced with strange electric mechanisms with one or more functions. They lack a power source, so someone trained in their use carries a battery within them that with time recharges from their metabolism. This is my suggested way of simulating mana.

A tool has one function. A kit has several.

List of "tomes"

• Physics kit
• Chemistry kit
• Geology kit
• Climatology kit
• Fluid dynamics kit
• Medicine kit
• Field lab kit
• Relativity kit
• Cross-discipline kit
• Psychology kit

Food

Humans on Snowglade are vegetarian these days (even though the player might stray) so the shops in Metropolis won't buy or sell meat products (including citizen raw meats!).

Instead

• Dried tomato
• Cornbread
• Baked sharproot
• Ration of chaw

Alky is hard liquor, a sort of brandy. It has some nutritious value, but it will confuse you if you don't have some confusion resistance. With resistance it's just fine.

Since some of the mechs have organic parts, the mechs make food to keep these in working order. The food in question is very industrial but mostly well edible.

• Sweetyeast
• Vatsoup
• Protein cakes
• Sourbread

Some mech food can have the "poisoned" ego type. It is poisoned to harm and hopefully kill vermin like you, but luckily the poison can be detected before eating. In rarer and nastier cases the food can be infected with nanites. This is a deeper and more deadly flag. Eaten disassembler nanites are more deadly than the disassemblers you normally get hit with. They don't harm the worn equipment, only the person, and produce a chronic condition that doesn't go away unless cured. Think Black Breath.

Food that isn't good to eat can be detected safely before eating by the following things:

• Resistance to the specific "element" (poison/disassemblers)
• Food safety detection ability (not very hard to get)
• Plain old identifying

Eggs

It is possible "summon pets" by "planting" suitable eggs in organic corpses where they quickly grow to maturity by devouring the flesh of the corpse from the inside.